Nestene Energy Unit

[elkad]

The only way I can figure the prop department made this, is ether they had a two part mold & swirled around a melted liquid plastic, or they had a reverse vacuum former. That's the type of device they use to make plastic pop bottles.
The color scheme looks to be a pink & purple cotton candy color. Start with a pink base & add a little purple around the side for shading.
As for the ... Aaa.. I don't know what you'd call them,... Bumps? They seam to be random in shape, but oval in similarity.

Spearhead From Space


Terror Of The Autons

[meantimebob]

Looks like tinted fibreglass to me, so probably a 2 part mold. The broken one the Doctor examines is definitely just a layer of Gel coat, but you can see the reinforcing strands of glass matting in some of the shots here.

[elkad]

Doesn't look like fiberglass to me.   Besides fiberglass isn't that transparent. I think the strands your seeing are ether plastic strands dribbled in the prop when making or, the prop maker put strands of cotton inside to make the light brighter & give it a vain like texture, making the idea of a living plastic.


Makes me think of the Master Brain in "The Mind Robbers". They used long cotton strands..I think..to make the brain's fibrous nerves.

[meantimebob]

I have to disagree. I've worked with fibreglass a lot and know what it looks like. First off, resin is transparent. It's only when you add the glass matting that it becomes opaque, like the complete Nestene unit. The only other substance the broken shell could be, is sugar glass. As the complete Nestene units are fibreglass, I can't see them using a completely different material for the broken version, but I suppose it's possible. 

[davidnagel]

Are we sure they are fibreglass at all? And the strands we're seeing is the material they've used to make the prop cloudly looking/hide the light?

[elkad]

I have to disagree. I've worked with fibreglass a lot and know what it looks like. First off, resin is transparent. It's only when you add the glass matting that it becomes opaque, like the complete Nestene unit. The only other substance the broken shell could be, is sugar glass. As the complete Nestene units are fibreglass, I can't see them using a completely different material for the broken version, but I suppose it's possible.

Wouldn't making fiberglass with out the fiber, just be a Resin plastic?

I searched around for a clear fiberglass for comparison. The only thing I could find was a Super 800 8 oz Clear 26" x 144", 2-1/2" corrugated fiberglass sheet at ePlastics.

[elkad]

I forgot to add a link to my build.   http://tardisbuilders.com/index.php/index.php?topic=9929

[meantimebob]

Wouldn't making fiberglass with out the fiber, just be a Resin plastic?

I searched around for a clear fiberglass for comparison. The only thing I could find was a Super 800 8 oz Clear 26" x 144", 2-1/2" corrugated fiberglass sheet at ePlastics.

It would be just a coat of resin, without the glass matting, which is added for strength. I wouldn't call it plastic.

That corrugated sheet has glass strands in it for strength.

Also, you have to remember what materials were available to the show at the time. Almost everything that couldn't be made of wood was made of fibreglass - or latex rubber. The Nestene units are not made from latex rubber.

[tony farrell]

Plastics - acetates or coloured acrylic plastics (either clear or translucent) and PVC were also widely available from the mid-1950s onwards.

These were frequently used in Dr Who productions and in other TV shows: For example, the original Tardis roundel backings were vacuum-formed from PVC, the Perspex screens on the Brachacki set were made from steel frames fitted with clear-tinted 8' by 4' acrylic sheets. Similarly, the pebbled glass Tardis windows weren't glass, like the signage, they too were plastic.

Sheet plastics were widely available in thicknesses of 0.0625" (or less - from specialist suppliers which the prop makers would have used) and therefore would be capable of being vacuum and/or heat-formed to the desired shapes by skilled VFX technicians and prop makers.

Don't forget too that the BBC, ITV, Ealing, Elstree, Bray, Pinewood, Shepperton, Shawcraft, Ackland-Snow etc were all within 'spitting distance' of each other. All these specialists hired-out their services to one-another. So, in addition to wood, fibreglass, sugar-glass and rubber, the talents and skills to mould plastics were undoubtedly also available & widely used.  

In 1969's "Spearhead from Space" and again in "Terror of the Autons" , Robert Holmes wrote a story about the consequences of being over-reliant on plastics - sadly, how right he has been proven to be! 

T

[meantimebob]

What are you trying to say exactly? You think the Nestene units were made of moulded plastic? Or perhaps cunningly crafted from acrylic sheet? Or were vac formed? All I'll say is, I have a background in model making for tv and used GRP a hell of a lot. That's it. I don't want to drag this out any longer.

[ciderman]

I'm pretty certain there's a Reeltime spoof sketch for fake actor Barrington Black which has a Spearhead from Space segment with a replica energy unit on that's pretty close to the original. It was on the JNT video.

[tony farrell]

What are you trying to say exactly? You think the Nestene units were made of moulded plastic? Or perhaps cunningly crafted from acrylic sheet? Or were vac formed? All I'll say is, I have a background in model making for tv and used GRP a hell of a lot. That's it. I don't want to drag this out any longer.

I was simply politely commenting on your previous statement and am saying that light-weight, thermo-formable/mould-able plastics were in widespread use from the 1950s onwards and that therefore it isn't quite correct to say that

almost everything that couldn't be made of wood was made of fibreglass - or latex rubber.

T

[meantimebob]

That's why I used the word 'almost'.

[elkad]

You think this would work? Can I use a plaster mold with wood reinforcement as a substitute for a metal blow mold?

The Idea is to heat up a plastic bottle that can fit in the mold cavity & slowly blow it up with an air compressor.

You think this might work, or do you think I may need more reinforcement in the plaster? Your thoughts?  

[fivefingeredstyre]

You could give it a go, can't see why it wouldn't work.

The mould would have to be two part, in order to get you bottle out again once you've blown it into shape. And you would also have to find a way of filling the neck hole of the bottle once you've moulded it. As there's nothing inside the blown section filling is going to be difficult, but not insurmountable